"Juli, if you don't behave," my aunt queen Paulisianna proclaimed with annoying regularity, "you are going to be packed off to your aunt queen Caroline in London," my aunt Paulisianna avoiding the term banishment, the stern, unyielding set of her features implying it all too clearly. London's queen Caroline, my aunt Paulisianna if in a particularly irritable mood felt necessary to add, would demand sixteen hours a day hard labor at a sewing machine, "sixteen hours a day and twice that on Sunday," though I suspected even at the time that Paulisianna's pronouncement was something of an exaggeration even beyond that which was intended as such.

My aunt Caroline would, Paulisianna continued if in a particularly foul mood, be well within her rights to sell me into common service to any of a hundred other kings and queens in country all across Europe many of whom would demand all manner of grueling, common labor in return for my "keep." I could end my name stricken from title entirely, sold to some half civilized "provincials" in the likes of the Pennsylvanias or the Virginias, sold even to the tribes entirely beyond civilization's frontiers if I persisted in behavior "most unbecoming of a titled Lady."

I remember, to this day, shuddering with frightened violence after these frightening audiences with Syril's queen Paulisianna, stealing in despondent quiet up Orlie House's stairs to my rooms, seeking consolation in the pages of Julianna, leafing through a half dozen of the journals and histories until uncle Georgie switched off the expensive power to the corner of Syril Residence in which I and another half dozen Ladies on title though of no great consequence on title dwelt.

Julianna (according to my aunt Paulisianna my great, great (about ten greats in all) grandmother) claims in the pages of her journals to have been queen Julia Ellen's great (another ten or so of them) granddaughter. London Town (today's London of imperial consequence) was founded by Julia Ellen's children when they and a small troop of wandering refugees fled into the South and then somehow got themselves across the ocean following the destruction of old Norecomb and the greater part of the old civilized North during the wars which seem to have raged almost continually in Julia Ellen's later years (though academicians today have determined that Julianna's accounts are interspersed with any number of passages now thought to have been "borrowed" from literature predating even the civilization of the old North, said passages identified by various manner of anachronism and downright fancy. I still marvel in emotional sympathy, I suppose, for the story of Julia Aretta's flight from the palace of Julius Caesar, he conferring with George Washington on the telephone over the disposition of the Americas when the ancient Julias arrived (though I will always remember the smug satisfaction I felt when at academy I alone in a class of thirty insisted, to the instructor's nodding approval, that Caesar and Washington were not close contemporaries). If Julianna's accounts contain certain inaccuracies, anachronisms, and exaggerations, staid, skeptical scholars working today beneath the spires and turrets of London and Syril Town's Academies will admit that Julianna provides us our most accurate insight into the raw, untamed world of the old North which Julia Ellen knew, the old Kilenish term "town" little more than a word to Julia Ellen (little more than that as late as Julianna herself, the Helen and Troy of her own times now thought to be literary device of one sort or another in her attempt to explain civilization as she knew and experienced it)).

Pondering my possible banishment to London Town most evenings over the course of the three years I spent in Syril Town's Orlie House (having not actually been banished to Syril's Orlie House in terms which might be pronounced judicial proceeding (queen Paulisianna had to do something with me following my mother's death, I an unattached Lady on title with no sizable inheritance, so Paulisianna stuck me in a quiet, out of the way corner of Syril's Orlie House) I usually and purposefully lost myself in Julianna's translations of Julia Ellen's poetry, perusing hand written copies of hand written originals far into the night, wondering what life in the old North and my storied ancestors had really been like. I stood a great many evenings at my room's windows supposing even the English Isles had once resembled the wild and primeval old North - and I stood illusions dispelled as I gazed across a state Residence's majestic, delicately manicured and eminently civilized lawns, gazed with sighing resignation toward smokestacks in the near distance and motorized, mechanized civilization rather than anything which might have resembled the wilds of Julia Ellen's and Julianna's old North. And so I stood sometimes gazing in speculative wonder toward the southern horizon, wandering in quiet fancy toward that which had, ever since Paulisianna had begun threatening to banish me there, become for me something of an intriguing mystery.

The journey down half the length of the English Isles from Syril Town to Charles and Caroline Albert's London takes a day and a half in an overland motor coach, perhaps another day in early spring when a great many roads are likely to be washed out (a great many of queen Paulisianna's in the north are always washed out, Charles and Caroline's in the south slightly better maintained, bridges in the south often intact throughout the entire year.)) London, town and country, say most from Syril and the north who have made the journey, is incompressible, London Town imperial majesty of imponderable proportions. Albert House (Julianna would, I suppose, have pronounced Albert House Caesar's Golden Palace or something of the sort) is declared the essence of "palatial" and ostentatious magnificence, its spires and turrets leaving one indeed with the impression of having seen a storybook "palace" from the furthest reaches of antiquity. I strolled any number of times during the three years I passed in Syril Town's Orlie House out to the army airfield in order to pass a few minutes in idle conversation with flyers from the south (London rather than the flyers as often as not the subject of brooding fantasy. Nineteen by then, I'd all but given up hope of amorous consequence, had resigned myself to perpetual dowager status if that be my lot.) I sometimes imagined in moments of wicked mischief accepting one or another of the flyer's brazen propositions (flyers (along with highwaymen and the like) among the few who would dare such toward a titled Lady she in appearance obviously no longer pristine, naive innocence). I sometimes imagined myself abandoning dignity and propriety entirely, stealing into the back of some handsome young scoundrel's airplane he whisking me the length of the English Isles in an hour or two, London to be whatever mystery and intrigue it was to be.

Stepping from my room's window on Orlie House's upper floor after long minutes idle musing of the sort, the fantasy invariably gives way to a sense of sighing, melancholy resignation. Sent packing to Syril Town and its queen Paulisianna at sixteen years of age, I had at the time no reason to suspect that life in London's Albert House with Charles and Caroline, at nineteen years of age, would be a good deal more pleasant than life for me had been in Syril Town over the past three years. London and the south have certainly been a sore disappointment for a great many other people from across civilization fled for one reason or another to the imperial and industrial center of civilization. As many transients and dispossessed commons will be found along outcountry highways on the English Isles fleeing from London as are fleeing to it, entire families in search of sanctuary and permanent resident status wandering the highways, destitute commons who'd hoped to find positions for hire in London's industrial and ship yards turning north for the Midlands. London Town, say most escaping it for one reason or another, "is big. Once you's seed it, though, you's seed it." Flyers from London and the south assigned duty at Syril's army airfield exude little greater enthusiasm. "King Charlie pays good," they shrug, "leastways good as anyone else hirin' a late."

Aunt Paulisianna, I decided from time to time during my sojourn in Orlie House, was probably right. I doubted queen Caroline required a great deal more than ten or twelve hours labor even from Albert House's retained servants. Still, I had at the time no reason to suspect that Caroline of London would be any less demanding a task mistress than was Paulisianna. And London is London, Albert House Albert House. I doubted at the time that London's queen Caroline could or would perceive any consequential difference between a Lady of my rank and a chamber maid. And at nineteen years of age, I'd lost any fanciful illusion that my position on title afforded me a great many assurances not available to a common resident actually subject to judicial banishment. Although it had become a rarity, any queen anywhere in Europe was indeed, quite to the extent that any queen anywhere was, well within her rights to strike a Lady's name from title, the former Lady then a salable commodity (having long since graduated from academy, I stood a courtier advocate arguing before my aunt Paulisianna's court suddenly and keenly on more than a few occasions aware that my figure was that which could be called mature, hourglass allure to every voluptuous extreme - and my aunt Paulisianna after some "behavior most unbecoming of a Lady and an officer of the court" starring appraising scrutiny toward that which in Harold VIII's time might have fetched a considerable price). It's rumored that several elderly maidservants in London's Albert House now held in retention began life in courts somewhere in civilized Europe as titled Ladies, imperial London that which it was under the (notoriously) memorable reign of Harold VIII. Although no one will compare today's Charles and Caroline Albert with Harold, Albert House and the south are still by most proclaimed the age's bastion of implacable imperial conservatism.

The first and only time to that point in my life I ever had occasion to meet Charles and Caroline Albert of London occurred shortly after my eighteenth birthday. Progressing north across the English Isles in an impressive entourage of motor carriages, guntrucks prominent to the front and rear, the king and queen of London conducted a tour of their crown possessions in a half dozen countries across the Midlands, the tour a nuisance, I've no doubt, in country where the more impoverished of the Midland's kings and queens would find themselves hard pressed to provide accommodations deemed adequate by a great many grande dames and other such lofty personages traveling in the imperial court.

As soon as word arrived that the imperial progress had set out north from the Midlands, my aunt queen Paulisianna flung herself into frantic motion, she a whirlwind of frenzied, majestic demand, Syril Town cringing in the shadows until she and her own entourage of intimates, grande dames, and courtier hangers on of various title had fluttered past. I've no doubt Gentlemen vice roys and their Ladies on mountain tops and in hidden valleys all across the north posted marshals as lookouts along the approaches to their Residences, the vice roys and their Ladies peering through their Residence windows in anxious dread. I sat a week in Orlie House myself polishing knives and forks and spoons, anxious dread in my own features, a dozen of my girls quite aware that their eighteen year old mistress would perform a great deal more than her fair share of the work. Polishing knives and forks and spoons, about ten or twenty million of them, I then polished them all over again when they did not, of course, meet with my aunt Paulisianna's approval.

"Oh good Lord, must I do everything myself," Paulisianna groans, snatches a half dozen spoons from the table, runs cleaning cloths over them in a frenzied fury, the same in her features as she flutters away. "I'll be laughing stock for London's entire court. Charles and Caroline will think us slovenly barbarians. Must I do everything myself?"

"So there," sneers Chary, first heiress of Syril and the north, haughty arrogance in the precious "princess's" features as she flutters in flowing magnificence on the queen's heals.

"Disgraceful - slothful - oh, you'll never amount to anything," declare the court's grande dames as they too process from the chamber, and my tears are a mix of frustration and anger as I snatch up a handful of spoons, my girls doing the same with expressions of remorseful apology - at least for a minute or two. I'd returned, for "the princess" Chary Syril's haughty little sneer, a sneer of no less biting vehemence. I just couldn't at the time, however, emulate Syril's first heiress in the manner in which she deported herself toward Orlie House's retained servants, they for Syril's first heiress Chary of little greater consequence than horses in the stables, a riding whip in "the princess" Chary's hands a source of terror for a great many sixteen year old girls retained by Orlie House. (Several of the girls seated at table with me that day in Orlie House polished silverware with dutiful diligence, they the same who on several occasions over the past three years had approached me along one of Orlie House's corridors very genuine expressions of terror in their eyes, they quite aware that a sneer from Chary Syril directed toward me would be returned with an answering sneer, I never reputed to be, and never actually, I suppose, a respecter of lofty, august personage. I never personally witnessed Chary Syril lifting a whip to one of the girls, though I suppose she took pains to avoid doing so in my presence, I intimating in no uncertain terms that I would consider behavior of the sort exceptionally unladylike and a matter to be brought to Paulisianna's attention in open court. "Oh, you will, will you?" or something of the sort from Chary. "I most certainly will," my reply, the dialogue back and forth in repetitive, standard cadence until we both stood before Syril's queen explaining "behavior most unbecoming of titled Ladies." (I will have to admit, I suppose, that Paulisianna, though seldom concerning herself for angry red scars on a sixteen year old common girl's back (collecting a dozen and a half of them during the three years I resided in Syril's Orlie House involved little more than a deposition to one of the court's clerks) scowled quite as much annoyance toward Syril's first heiress Chary as she did toward me discovering our latest episode of "behavior most unbecoming of young Ladies. What on earth," Paulisianna groans in irritation toward both Chary and me, "might have been the consequences had a newspaperman or the like witnessed such an outrageous spectacle, two Ladies of my court deporting themselves as any ruffian might? Why - I would be laughing stock for every court in Europe."))

The grand and auspicious day finally arrived. Canon boomed warning and salute in Syril Town's harbor. Syril's home guard paraded along the expected route of the procession its captains attired in "Napoleonic" magnificence. Several dozen of Syril's titled Gentlemen and Ladies arrayed themselves according to rank and class across Orlie House's lawns, a hundred colorful pennants flying from the spires and turrets. I've no doubt Syril, town and country in their thousands, lined every path and lane along the parade route, as impressive a sight as Charles, Caroline, and London's imperial court were likely to have seen anywhere on the English Isles, and a sight calculated by Paulisianna with the ready assistance of town and country constabulary to be just exactly that.

Equally as impressive, however, was Charles and Caroline's motor procession, London's imperial court almost in its entirety a parade miles long, the first heiress of London's motor carriage hardly less glowing and imposing than the opulent, gold plated palace on wheels conveying Charles and Caroline themselves.

Decisively impressive, however, is the only way to describe the sight of imperial army aircraft parading a hundred feet above Syril Town's rooftops, dozens of them in awe inspiring formation the howling shriek of their engines penetrating into every hidden corner and crevice of Syril Town.

"Cowards," Paulisianna had seethed several evenings before when informed that Syril's home guard flyers had refused en mass to provide a countering demonstration. "I intend to hang the lot of them."

"Now, my dear -" uncle Georgie had whimpered in protesting defense on behalf of Syril's flyers, attempting to explain the differences between Syril's aircraft and those owned by London's imperial armies. "Our boys," Syril's king could only conclude, "are far better of sitting this one out on the ground."

Standing breathless on Orlie House's lawns with a dozen other second heiresses, I and they watched with carefully concealed expressions of amusement as Paulisianna glared into the air toward London's imperial aircraft screaming across Syril Town in nothing more than seconds. No one, I suppose, Syril's queen included, can doubt that Syril, and the north in its entirety for that matter, remains under "the gracious and benevolent protection of London's king and queen," Caroline's clerks of the imperial vault dispatching bills of particular to a hundred courts across Europe requesting "modest though necessary monetary remuneration in return for London's gracious and benevolent protection," impressive parades of aircraft dispatched in order to rattle the Residence windows of kings and queens failing to attend to said monetary remuneration in an adequately timely manner. Captains commanding contingents of the imperial guard quartered in home guard armories across civilization have attained their rank solely because of their proficiency in financial rather than military matters, the latter attended to if at all by "first soldiers" in the ranks while the Gentlemen officers attend to the former. In essence, even if not in title, London is every bit the seat of imperial consequence which Ruse Town is. Kings, queens, and potentates of various title in country across civilization will apply to London's imperial court for leave to make war on one another. Very few will do so until said leave is granted. And it's no secret that title even to the empress of Ruse's crown is still housed in London's imperial archives fifty years after the war.

The grand procession finally wound its way from Syril Town's King's Lane onto Orlie House's lawns. Aunt Paulisianna's features settled into genial insincerity, she and uncle Georgie descended Orlie House's grand steps in order to receive the king and queen of London. Charles emerged first from the motor carriage, Charles tall, a youthful middle aged, robust and energetic in appearance and demeanor, wearing the broad, handlebar mustache become popular at the time in courts across Europe. George of Syril, my maternal uncle, less imposing than Charles though not lacking a certain bland and quiet dignity, wore an expression of genial and uncomplicated humor as he reached for Charles of London's hand. I could, I suppose, imagine two ancient kings from Julia Ellen's times greeting each other with such casual mien and demeanor. George of Syril has always been more than content to resign Syril and the north into London's "gracious and benevolent protection," (though if in a particularly irreverent (or inebriated) mood, Georgie will muse over who exactly Syril and the northern half of the English Isles are being protected from, Syril hardly a frontier realm in the likes of the Americas bellicose tribal chiefs wandering its borders). Charles and Georgie, both having as young first heirs been flyers themselves, gazed with expressions of buoyant enthusiasm toward London's parading aircraft circling a few miles away preparing for another screaming pass over town.

The queens of London and Syril exchanged pleasantries I could only call the essence of restrained and cautious suspicion. Paulisianna's features, though practiced and artful civility, retained even toward Caroline of London that ever present edge of condescension, quite as though to remind everyone, including London's queen, that London's queen Caroline had begun life right here in Syril herself. "I am," Paulisianna does not of course quite proclaim aloud, "every bit as beautiful as you, Caroline," that by and large the truth, Paulisianna in her middle forties at the time still an exceptionally beautiful woman. "It could as easily have been me now seated on the imperial throne." Paulisianna, to my never ending amaze, seems able to anticipate the exact instant a newspaperman's camera will flash, her features for that one quick instant the essence of sweet, syrupy charm. Paulisianna does not, of course, deem London's parading aircraft worthy of further notice, takes extreme pains to avoid even the appearance of doing so (Georgie, I suspect, appreciative of her doing so for his own reasons those the essence of calm, rational sanity. London's and Syril's kings were indeed at the time on amicable terms. No one, however, at least in the corridors of Orlie and Albert House, can ever forget an incident which occurred during their fathers' reigns, aircraft from Syril patrolling in support of the home guard engaged in some minor colonial squabble, an indigenous vice roy subject to Syril and questioning that subjugation for one reason or another, aircraft from London's imperial garrisons patrolling along the fringes of the disputed country watching it all. A dozen of Syril's home guard aircraft their flyers probably caught up in some mood of juvenile bravado flew in provocative formation toward London's imperial aircraft. Obscene gestures usually little more than off color salutes exchanged between imperial flyers from London and Syril's provincials were probably that day exchanged with angry vehemence, London's and Syril's kings half a world away having for several weeks at the time waged a particularly vehement war of words against each other in the newspapers. A half dozen young colonials flying for Syril's home guard, it is speculated, partook in the exchange of obscene gestures their hands wandering nervously back to their gun triggers, they supposing a war of words on the English Isles no different than it might have been anywhere else the kings waging that war eventually to decide that words weren't enough (I suppose those half dozen young colonials flying for Syril's home guard couldn't imagine that the English Isles of today were remarkably different than that which was portrayed in their school books, antiquity's "England" and "Scotland" constantly at bloody war with each other, London's and Syril's kings a half dozen times since Julia Ellen flinging their armies across the English Isles intent on each other's subjugation or destruction.) Two brash young flyers from London's imperial garrisons, it's little doubted, eagerly flung their aircraft toward the dozen from Syril's home guard advancing in provocative challenge, testified subsequently that their maneuvers couldn't possibly have been perceived as dangerous or threatening. Recordings of radio transmissions played for months across the English Isles portray sudden confused fright in young men's voices for battle which wasn't supposed to be happening. It ended the way military analysts had always predicted it would. Two aircraft from London's imperial garrisons downed the dozen flown by Syril's home guard and colonials in seconds. London's Lindon, uncle Georgie once told me in brooding musing for memories of the incident, had been quite as emotionally devastated over the matter as had been his own father, both Lindon of London and Jake Syril having for years exuded all manner of martial bravado. "Boys will be boys," they shrugged when informed that some tribal village in southeast Asia had been burned to the ground by exuberant young captains "who must be allowed a measure of latitude in the manner of their conduct if our armies are to insure the safety of civilization," Jake Syril's and Lindon's cups hoisted in martial ferocity issuing the pronouncement. London's Lindon, however, had already become that which he was to remain throughout his later years, London's "emperor" anything but imperial, a demeanor of martial ferocity discarded, the flower gardens surrounding Albert House of far greater consequence to London's king than anything occurring along some frontier half a world away. "Jake -?" uncle Georgie tells me Lindon asked as he climbed Orlie Houses steps, tears, they say, in his eyes, "what the hell happened?" Jake Syril stood quite as bemused and helpless, both he and Lindon by then having forgotten the martial exuberance of their youth, neither able to understand "how such a thing could have happened.")

Standing on the lawns of Orlie House they festive, colorful gaiety, I turned my attention finally toward the one person who was the focus of intrigued attention on the part of civilization in its entirety. Caroline, queen of London, empress, therefore, of the civilized world, is my maternal aunt, also in her early forties at the time, though like Syril's Paulisianna still possessed of far more than her fair share of youthful, dazzling beauty. Caroline, reaching for Paulisianna's hand, smiled - sweetly. I suppose Caroline is the only woman in Europe who would or could dare such toward Syril's queen Paulisianna. I and everyone else residing in Syril's Orlie House (that to include Georgie himself) will on rare occasions dare a hesitant and cautious smile toward Syril's queen if we have reason to suspect her to be in a particularly benevolent or charitable mood. We'd never smile "sweetly" toward Paulisianna, however. Few queens anywhere in Europe, for that matter, would dare a great deal more than cautious reverence toward Paulisianna, said caution accounted for in part by the force of Paulisianna's personality, in just as great a part, I suppose, by the tonnage of armaments in Syril's armories and the tonnage of gold and silver in Orlie House's vaults, that tonnage on both counts second only to London's and Albert House's. It is, however, a faint and distant second. Caroline of London took no particular notice of her parading aircraft either. I suppose she felt no pressing need to do so, a direct, unabashed - and sweet smile toward Paulisianna more than sufficient.

For ten more minutes, the kings, queens, and Chary and Belina, the first heiresses (no heirs being apparent or expected at the time) of London and Syril traded idle banter on the lawns of Syril's Orlie House. Paulisianna finally motioned Caroline of London toward another half dozen of my aunts and uncles, toward several dozen of my cousins, lastly of course (I'll explain later) toward myself.

"Juli -" queen Caroline repeated after Paulisianna had presented me, "why - you're the very picture of your mother, my dear."

I curtsied, dared a reserved and bashful smile, then watched the kings, queens, and Chary and Belina, Syril's and London's first heiresses, promenade into Orlie House. As was my habit at the time, I then strolled from the Residence's lawns onto the lanes of Syril Town just to loose myself for a few hours in the evening, Syril for the auspicious occasion in drunken and riotous festival just barely contained by the constabulary.

I remember sitting at a small public house table along the walkways for quite some time gazing about in idle amusement toward the boisterous crowds, pondering my presentation to London's queen in introspective quiet.

"You would never believe it today just by looking at her," my mother used to tell me, "but Caroline was just - one of the crowd here in Orlie House. She was a shy little thing, her dreams as modest ay anyone's, would never have dreamt that she might be the one noticed by London's handsome and dashing young heir, no matter how beautiful she was."

"Why does queen Caroline never visit Syril, mother?" I asked a short time before my mother died.

She'd sighed a long moment's searching thought, and then only hinted at the facts of the matter, leaving it to me to obtain the rest from various manner of whispering in the corridors of Residences over the years (whispering of a sort which no newspaperman valuing his neck would dare print for public consumption). Apparently the only people who had been anxious to see Charles then the dashing and celebrated first heir and heir apparent of London and Caroline then an unknown second heiress residing in "the provincial backwaters" of Syril married had been Charles and Caroline themselves, my grandfather Jake Syril and Lindon then king of London having arranged politically, socially, and financially advantageous marriages for Charles and Caroline to others, threatening the young lovers with everything up to and including banishment from court if they persisted in "their foolish, obstinate, romantic nonsense." Lindon of London, at least, seems to have reconciled himself to the inevitable shortly before his death, summoning his son and his Syril daughter in law home from their self imposed exile in Montreal of the Canadas.

I pondered my presentation to Caroline of London another year following their progress to Syril, trying to determine if it had been at least some hint of emotional intimacy in that reserved wisp of a smile she had offered me. I just couldn't, I finally decided, imagine Caroline queen of London to be just "one of the crowd" in Syril's Orlie House. I suppose, for most of that year, I felt as much romantic intrigue as anyone might pondering Caroline and London's handsome young heir fleeing in secret from two of civilization's most powerful kings, searching for a cleric who might not feel intimidated by two of civilization's most powerful kings. When the bishop of Montreal agreed to perform "a secret" ceremony, Jake Syril and Lindon of London had brought most of civilization to the brink of civil war, kings and queens from the Canadas to the Australans lining up and choosing sides, tribes a considerable distance beyond civilization's frontiers watching in rapt fascination. Both Jake and Lindon, of course, adamantly denied that matters as personal and parochial as their children's romantic liaisons had anything to do with approaching hostilities, rumors that Charles and Caroline had eloped, were already married, denounced as malicious lies perpetrated by scoundrels in order to sell newspapers. "Charles, my dutiful and most obedient son and heir," Lindon's voice was heard in vehement proclamation on radios across civilization, "is progressing across the Americas on a goodwill tour. My son and I remain as always on amicable and affectionate terms." The facade began to crumble, however, when pictures of Caroline, an unknown heiress from Syril, began appearing in newspapers across the Canadas, Charles and Caroline's progress to this or that town discovered to be concurrent on an increasingly frequent basis. A dozen little brush wars which had broken out in "backwood country" here and there across civilization were, Lindon of London further proclaimed, no indication whatsoever that the "pax imperium" centered on London was not the accomplished fact it had been almost since the times of the ancient Julias.

Personal affairs, they whisper even today in both Orlie and Albert House's corridors, had everything to do with the matter. Both Jake Syril and Lindon of London spent a year stomping from one client country to the next attempting to rally support for their respective causes, kings and queens and potentates of various sort owing the smallest degree of patronage approached, agents scurrying among tribes on every continent's interior intent on various manner of mischief. Contract and treaty pacts had been abrogated, both Jake and Lindon proclaimed. On the English Isles themselves, bandits, highwaymen, and renegades of various stripe hostile to the one had been provided sanctuary and refuge in country loyal to the other. A ship plying the channel's waters sank, sabotage, cried the newspapers, and another half dozen brush wars erupted. With very few exceptions, however, such hostile and provocative incidents occurred with ever increasing frequency only after another spate of rumors appearing in "scandalous, unprincipled" newspapers suggesting that Charles and Caroline were something more than passing acquaintances.

Both London's and Syril's titled Gentlemen, of course, continually deported themselves as such are wont to deport themselves in "affairs" of the sort, quite as though inebriated by some moth like chemical impelling them fanatically into the flame, Charles, despite Caroline's pleading tears, stepping as eagerly and as fanatically as anyone toward that flame. Seconds representing Gentlemen from Syril's camp approached Charles or his associates at least a half dozen times over the course of a few months. Attire and demeanor spotless, polished perfection, bows of polite, proprietous courtesy were exchanged, the ritual of the thing inflexible and demanding, endless shame the consequence of the most minor lapse in conformity. Seconds from one party then requested, "at their earliest convenience, the honor of the other party's attendance upon a matter of personal importance to be discussed in private at a time and place to be deemed by both parties appropriate to said discussions," in other words, a dark alley or the like seconds posted as "lookouts" while the Gentlemen principles gloried in "honorable, unavoidable destiny," (phrases equally juvenile or imbecilic used in Gentlemen's smoking rooms across the English Isles recounting details of such encounters). When a dozen young Gentlemen of rank had been carried back to London or Syril with bullet holes in them, several of the wounds fatal, Jake Syril and Lindon of London seem to have paused for a moment's rational thought. That, however, resulted in nothing more than a spate of new legislation on top of existing legislation which very few constabularies had ever been able to enforce to begin with.

When, as was inevitable, Ruse turned drooling, anticipatory eyes toward London and a squabbling, fragmented west its armies now embroiled in containing civil disturbance as tribes along every frontier looted outcountry farms with impunity, Caroline, proclaim a great many whisperers in a great many Residence's corridors across civilization east and west, finally shed tears of despairing anguish as she pushed herself from Charles' arms, and his bed, one morning, Caroline urging Charles to return to London and have their marriage annulled, make peace with his obstinate father, Caroline urging Charles to forget her and allow her to return to Syril and plead for absolution from her own obstinate father.

I've little doubt these rumors, at least, reflect the truth, Caroline proven time and again over the years the essence of perceptive brilliance, she uniquely prone to have shuddered for the prospect of another "Great War" between east and west, prone to shudder with emotional violence that she in some insane and nonsensical way might be the cause of a war which could easily have engulfed civilization in its entirety. (And Ruse, twenty years ago, was not the Ruse it had been thirty years prior to that during the era of the Great War. Rusean flyers no longer turned and fled at the first sight of opposition from London and the west. Rusean gunboats prowled provocatively to within a dozen miles of western ports. Most military analysts twenty years ago argued that London and the west would still have easily prevailed in a general conflagration, the west's aircraft in particular still superior in performance even if by a more narrow margin, the tonnage of armaments stockpiled in western armories sufficient to burn Ruse and the east in its entirety to the ground twenty times over. Ruse, these same analysts proudly proclaimed, could burn the west in its entirety to the ground no more than ten times over, and that if none of its aircraft were shot down in the attempt. At least half, smugly proclaimed the analysts, would be. London and the west standing on farm and in factory scratched its head in arithmetic speculation wondering exactly what was meant by the analyst's term "prevail." A few newspapers began to wonder if Lindon and Jake Syril should settle their differences. A few in colonial country brazenly insisted that they do so, bored and intoxicated bands of restless youths from tribal nations in such as the Americas rampaging at will among outcountry farms, councils of state occurring at nation level in the northern Canadas attended by chiefs previously the essence of pacificity suddenly deemed sinister and provocative.

The entire affair culminated in "the secret convocation" right here in Syril Town's Orlie House, Jake Syril noticing waning enthusiasm and support for "the cause" summoning clients some of whom hailed from mudhole country very few would have been able to locate on a map, clients who had a vague idea at best as to what exactly the cause was. Among these was one Edith Woonsey, Woonsey country a valley or two somewhere in the back Virginias, Edith to the consternation of the Virginia's vice roy a lawfully titled queen the origin and cause of her title long since forgotten, queen Edith prior to her embarking for Jake Syril's convocation requesting bids from contractors to supply her Residence with indoor plumbing. "Crazy Edith Woonsey," say the whisperers in both Albert and Orlie House, appeared at Jake Syril's convocation wearing flowing satin gowns and a crown the majestic jewels of which rivaled those housed in Orlie and Albert House's crown vaults. Born with reverential pomp and display on a golden litter to the head of the convocation assembled in Orlie House's Front Room, Edith Queen of Woonsey then proclaimed Lindon of London "a low down, good fer nuthin', egg suckin' chicken thief. Been stealin' chickens offa my farms all cross Woonsey country fer ten years now, he has. I seed him my own self, sure nuff, come sneakin' inta Woonsey in the dead a the night, stolt two a my prize layers right offa they's boxes, he did -"

They say four or five dozen clients of a more rational bent then pledged to Jake Syril gazed with ill concealed expressions of hilarity toward "crazy Edith," stared then with chastisement toward Jake. A war, after all, argued some from "civilized" country in Europe with highly proficient spies, fought in order to separate a Juliet from her Romeo, would be remembered as a war little more rational than a half dozen "crazy Edith" had fought searching for missing chickens. Jake Syril sat at the head of the convocation sighing a long moment's annoyance toward "crazy Edith" she puffing contentedly away on a massive cigar. Jake sighed one final appeal toward everyone else, and then, detecting, I suppose, something a great deal less than frenzied and fanatical support for his "holy cause" among his clients, just gave up. I suspect Edith Woonsey and her hour long tirade over missing chickens had jarred Syril's king and everyone else in Orlie House's Front Room back into a sense of reality. As massive a confederation of conspirators as Jake Syril had assembled, a civil conflagration with imperial London would in the end have been little more than collective suicide. London, after all, then as now, is London, the imperial and industrial center of civilization.

And London, twenty years ago, was seventy year old Mary, Lindon's "imperial" smirk for Jake Syril's failed war convocation fading on the instant as the adored and reverenced old queen mother processed into Albert House's court, eight dozen courtier ministers standing on either side of the central aisle gasping startled awe for a sight last witnessed a generation ago during the Great War.

"You are by no means too big, Lindon," queen Mary proclaimed, "that I shan't should I feel it necessary and politic to do so take you immediately and directly over my knee. Come to your senses, you great oaf. They love each other. You and your armies are not going to change that. And Caroline, in my judgment, is something a great deal more than your ordinary, run of the mill court beauty, will prove herself one of the most exceptional queens London has ever had. Charles, despite shortcomings inherited, I'm certain, from his father, recognizes in Caroline something a great deal more than her beauty. And you'd not be here at all, Lindon, had I supposed my own parents' pronouncements from the throne infallible," declared a seventy year old Mary who prior to the Great War had been a never ending source of delight for newspaper gossips far more brazen than any writing today. And Mary twenty years ago was still queen Mary, the august aura of Harold VIII and the times still surrounding her even if after Harold's death she had resigned title into Lindon's hands and by and large retired from public life. No one, however, twenty years ago, doubted that Mary ruled civilization quite to the extent that Caroline does today. Mary had but to dispatch a maid servant from her bed chambers on Albert House's upper floors, and a year's intricate web of intrigue spun by Lindon and London's imperial court crumbled on the instant.

And so Jake and Lindon's war was never fought. Edith Woonsey's house marshals shot the foxes which had been raiding her chicken pens, Mary's passing sent civilization into a months long agony of heart wrenching tears, and Charles finally took Caroline home to London with him, the majestic ceremonies at Saint Pauls heard on radios across the west the dutiful repetition of an already accomplished fact.

I glimpsed Caroline again only for a brief moment when after a visit of several days London's imperial court in stately procession finally took its leave of Syril's Orlie House. In order to obtain even this brief glimpse, I found it necessary to steal away from my work over the dye pots in the wool sheds, ignoring amused accusation in the eyes of a half dozen of my girls as I did so. I was, after all, doing Chary Syril a favor working her hours in the wool house as it was.

"Oh, please be a darling," Syril's first heiress had pouted earlier that morning accosting me as I stepped from Orlie House's rear staircase into the kitchens. The "princess" Chary will grace said haunt of domestics and retained servants with her august presence only when she is in fact engaged in intrigue of one sort or another. A half dozen servants owned by Orlie House, mostly commons under varying degrees of retention, pretend varying degrees of reverence for Chary Syril's august presence.

"Chary -" I seethed, my cheeks doubtlessly flushed with anger as I stammered the words, "I've worked three times for you - just this week - already -"

"Juli - dear Juli," Chary crooned, beneficent condescension in her pout as she assured me that any small courtesies extended her now will most certainly be remembered in the future, when Chary had ascended Syril's throne and could with a nod of her head send me packing from Syril's court. "I simply must attend Charles and Caroline away this morning. And I promise, my dear," as she had dozens of times in the past, "I will work an entire morning in your stead whenever you request that I do so." Chary already owed me innumerable "entire mornings," not to mention a great many more hours preparing lessons the tutor had assigned her. Chary, like a good many first heirs and heiresses who ascend thrones in the north, will depend on clerics and court clerks to read anything of a nature a great deal beyond the elementary which needs to be read in her court.

Presenting my grievances to Paulisianna either in court or informally seldom provided me with any great satisfaction.

"Oh for bother, girls," Paulisianna invariably groans as her entourage of maid servants adjust ice packs over her eyes attempting to alleviate another headache, emissaries from a dozen courts waiting about the Front Room on the queen of Syril's convenience, "why can't you settle your petty little squabbles between yourselves like proper young Ladies? Syril's first heiress and a Lady niece conducting themselves like ruffians? Honestly - what will the help think?" the help Paulisianna's less than tactful though still at the time widely used term for any resident of Syril on the commons rather than the titled lists. Transients and the like holding positions for hire are seldom noticed by Paulisianna.

About a year after Charles and Caroline's progress to Syril, matters between Chary and me finally came to a head.

Stepping from Orlie House's kitchens onto a back porch, I placed a plate of table scraps onto the steps, then leaned to pet a scraggly looking mongrel I had retrieved from a small tenement room near the steel works (the dog's mistress a fifteen year old transient girl who'd died brutal red scars covering her back, a shop manager under patronage to Orlie House and Chary Syril scoffing for the constabulary's inquiries, Chary returning little more than smirking amusement for my glances of accusation. I'll never know to what extent Chary Syril was personally involved in a perverse brutality not in the least unlike that so undeniably common at the time in Ruse and the east. I remember feeling compelled, however, to approach that small tenement room near Syril Town's steel works, the constabulary exuding shrugging indifference for a fifteen year old transient girl's fate they quite aware that Orlie House would appreciate no further inquiries on their part. I'd glanced a final moment toward a scraggly mongrel whimpering over his mistress' body, it's fate, I'd supposed, a death of frozen starvation in back alleys among the steel works, life for Syril Town's canine inhabitants as tenuous and precarious as for its common human inhabitants, life quite as tenuous and precarious in a modern town Syril's size as it might have been in Julia Ellen's wild, untamed North of antiquity. I'd save, I decided, at least one living creature from a small tenement room and a scene of unspeakable, perverse horror.)

My "Hero," I realized as I leaned on Orlie House's steps in order to pet him, was never going to be the picture of robust beauty. And still, I felt a measure of gentle satisfaction for the progress he had made in the past month under my care, felt gentle pleasure when he nuzzled my hand with obvious affection. Hero greets most others with growling suspicion.

Chary and Fredrick, married a month at the time, happened to stroll through the door a moment later (I'm not certain what (devious) business Chary had in the kitchens, Syril's "princess apparent" by then having discarded even the pretense of physical labor).

"Oh honestly, Juli," Chary groaned, Syril's first heiress attired in all her flowing magnificence, "why on earth do you waste your time with that pathetic creature?"

"Oh honestly, Chary -" I groaned in return, my voice obvious and mocking, though I decided, at least in this instance, against a - "mind your own d--- business, Chary."

"All the stupid creature does is growl at people."

"You have to be gentle with him, show him that he is loved. You of all people," I continued with accusing mischief, I suspect, in my voice as I raised my eyes to Syril's first heiress and future queen, "must be able to appreciate the meaning of the word charity, Chary."

"Of course I do," and an annoyed first heiress supposing to prove her assertion stepped abruptly forward, attempting a quick pat to the dog's head. Chary's gesture was characteristically anything but subtle, and Hero, of course, snapped, would have drawn blood had Chary's hand been an inch closer. Chary, stumbling backward, ended a flutter of flowing magnificence sitting in the mud at the base of the steps in a most amusing posture. A dozen residents of Orlie House and another dozen passers by strolling along Heton Lane found it necessary and politic to quickly avert their gazes. I'm certain I detected at least the hint of amusement in Fredrick's visage as he scrambled forward and with all manner of blustering, inane effusion for the plight of his bride attempted to assist her to her feet.

"My dear - oh, I say - my dear -" Fredrick spluttered and whimpered he from a small, backwood country in the Norways and not yet ready to assert himself in Syril. "My dear - are you - is your -" aghast dismay in his features he staring toward that part of Chary's gown which was now covered with a considerable layer of mud.

"Unhand me, you imbecile," Chary snarled, wrath in her features as she snatched the riding whip from Fredrick's hand, advancing in a fury toward my poor Hero.

"No, Chary," I challenged, imposing myself between Chary and the defenseless beast.

"I intend to deliver that vicious animal a lesson it will not soon forget-"

"I said no, Chary," and in abandoned desperation, Chary's arm raised and threatening, I locked a hand about her wrist. Snatching the whip from her hand, I flung it to the ground.

"How - how dare you - me - me - first heiress -" Chary now in a volcanic fury steamed and snarled, directing her rage toward her unfortunate and cowering husband a quick instant later. "Fredrick, you great blubbering coward, are you going to stand there and allow this outrage without so much as a whimper of protest?"

"Well - no - that is, I mean to say -" and poor Fredrick flung dismal, helpless eyes toward a sizable crowd now gathering to witness the spectacle. When Chary ascends Syril's throne, Fredrick, "purchased" for Chary's amusement from a bankrupt but ancient and respected country in the north, will be expected to share Syril's throne in silent, dignified propriety he a gaudily attired figurehead posing for the newspapermen's cameras (and I suppose Fredrick darting a half instant's glance toward me never even for that half instant seriously contemplated anything of a confrontational nature of any sort. He glanced, I suspect, toward everything he'd ever read about the northern half of the English Isles its inhabitants wont at any odd moment to divest themselves of the civility and propriety to which they'd never really become accustomed to begin with. The northern half of the English Isles are populated quite as is London and the south by people descended from Julia Ellen and the culture of the old North. And still, I suspect Fredrick darting a frightened glance toward me saw a Celtic or Scottish barbarian who must stand beside fur clad male warriors flinging javelins toward "Roman" invaders. (And my appearance, of course, just lends itself to the illusion. I'm tall, and to term it as I've heard it termed often enough by young Gentlemen(?) in the corridors of Syril's Orlie House, I'm "built." Fredrick, I suppose, darted a frightened glance toward some amazon warrior any thought of confrontation not greatly palatable to his far more delicate and refined taste (and I suppose several of Orlie House's Gentlemen had already warned Fredrick that he needn't, if he was sane, bother contemplating improprietous advances toward an amazon of voluptuously alluring form though one of imponderably quick dexterity who could easily and would, if not in a mood for improprietous advances, toss him promptly through a second floor window (I spent a cowering hour before Paulisianna after that incident of "behavior most outrageously unbecoming of a titled Lady."))))

Chary belched one more groan of annoyance and frustration toward Fredrick, directing her rage once again toward me.

"I intend -" Chary began, leaning for the whip.

"I said no, Chary," placing my foot onto same.

"How - how dare -"

And in another abrupt moment I stood knowing that I had an answer to her question.

"How dare I, Chary?" I seethed, my voice quiet though bitter accusation as I stepped face to face with her in intimidating proximity. "I dare, Chary, because I think this dog knows you, knows you with a whip in your hand, has seen you before -"

"You're mad -"

"I found this dog, Chary, in a tenement room near the steel works, a room in which a fifteen year old girl had been hung naked from the ceiling by her feet, whipped for hours - for nothing more than the sport of it."

I buried my eyes to hers as we stood in intimate, challenging proximity, and I shuddered in cold, awakening fright for that which I saw in her eyes. I'd almost hoped that it wasn't true. And still, I'd known all along that it was. First settling into rooms in Orlie House three years ago, I'd walked into a cousin's bedchambers supposing an evening with Chary would be the juvenile mischief it had been so often in the past between us. "Come on, Juli, you know you like it," and I'd stood giggling little more than amused mischief as Chary touched her lips to my own in teasing caress. "Oh Chary, stop it," I might some evenings have protested as she pushed my clothing away - and I stood naked reveling in little more than wild, abandoned delight. Chary is radiant, dazzling beauty, and still - it's waves of pouting envy in her eyes as she gazes toward me, I at best just pretty, and yet my figure at seventeen years of age a mature, hourglass allure to every possible extreme. "Chary -" I sighed and protested - and lay naked on the bed in docile submission as she bound my wrists and my ankles, she with whip in hand standing over her captive, barbarian warrior or something of the sort. "Chary, not so hard, you're hurting me," I gasped several evenings in genuine anger, decided one culminating evening that this was the last time I was going to play our foolish little game, a glance toward Chary strengthening my resolve. I wouldn't for an instant deny that I reveled as well for the mischief, had always felt a wickedly vain little delight for everything from gaping intrigue to pouting envy in my cousin's features. And I couldn't deny the ultimate, had some evenings played our licentious little games until I'd known it become for both of us unabashed sexual abandon. Flinging my eyes toward Chary's that culminating evening, however, I saw there something I suddenly knew was maniacal to extremes I could never before have imagined or comprehended.

"Chary -" I cried out in pain and angry demand when she swung her lash again. I writhed in fury, would as soon as I'd freed myself from the bonds "beat her senseless" quite as I had often enough in the past. And in another instant - I lay in sudden, abject terror realizing that she had indeed this evening bound rope about my wrists and ankles with cruel strength, my struggling efforts to free myself futile.

"Chary -" my cry fury for a lash of brutal ferocity - and the thing for me dazed, reeling terror as I flung my eyes to hers.

"Juli -" she whispered as she ran devouring eyes up and down my body, "oh Juli - you really are - exquisite. And you're quite correct, Juli. I'm mad with envy, always have been. Why deny it? But Juli - you're going to beat me senseless, are you? But - you're all tied up, Juli. I made sure, and - oh Juli, it's finally you this time, not just some chamber girl."

"Chary -" I gasped, trembling in building terror. I'd never prior to the moment given a great deal of thought to the rumors. "Chary - it's just - a game -"

"It used to be."

I flung my eyes again toward hers, and trembled with helpless, abandoned violence. She and I had never been anything close to intimate friends, had engaged in licentious mischief with each other ever since we were children. And still, I flung my eyes to a young woman who suddenly seemed someone I was seeing for the first time. She stood over me whip in hand her eyes ablaze with raw, hungry want - and the thing as quickly all something a world more. She stood over me whip in hand knowing that free of my bonds I could have sent her sprawling with a twist of my wrist - and she stood gasping in trembling ecstasy as I lay naked, bound, struggling in helpless terror.

I flung pleading eyes to hers, had for another timeless moment felt little more than foolish. I'd long since graduated the Academy, was a working courtier advocate already resigned to my "fate." I'd wandered into Chary's rooms that evening juvenile illusions long since discarded, that which existed between Chary and me sexual intrigue entirely devoid of affection. I'd stood in sighing annoyance as Syril's first heiress pushed the clothing from my body, had as I'd allowed her to wrestle me onto the bed reveled in some lascivious little delight for mischief seeming so mature and culminating. I'd lain in finished, reeling abandon as she tugged violently with the ropes, had glanced toward swooning delight in her eyes - had lain immersed in lascivious delight flinging my eyes the length of my body, giving way to a moment's vain, blatant delight to every possible extreme.

And it's yet again something I could never quite have imagined, not a toying sting but the lash biting onto my body with merciless ferocity.

"Chary -" my scream angry fury as I fought rope binding me to searing pain rather than a sting. "Chary - untie me -" my voice a threatening growl - and I flung my eyes again to hers, writhed in a frantic terror for that which I saw in her eyes. "Chary -" and it seemed a cry wrenched helplessly from my throat for a hand clawed onto my hair, my head snapped about with merciless violence.

It all for another timeless moment seemed ludicrous and foolish, Chary and I women, Ladies of a state court - and I lay trembling in convulsing terror, fought with the rope in frantic, primal desperation, lay again not quite certain how I could have allowed myself to be caught in something suddenly become such real and brutal horror.

I cried out again for the searing pain, writhed in helpless desperate abandon. I flung my eyes to hers as she dug a clawing hand into my hair - and it was yet again something culminating, a black immersing horror for that which I saw in her eyes.

And then - it was all something I could never before have imagined, something a world different than any licentious play had been. It was agony pounding the length of my body as she swung her lash with frenzied, merciless abandon. I gave up entirely, abandoned every pretense - screamed in pain, flung pleading eyes to hers. It was just some new, unrelenting agony, wild, frenzied delight in her eyes as she lashed me, gasps of ecstasy wrenched from her throat for a victim left bereft of every last dignity.

"Oh Juli," she cried out, "or Juli - yes - piss on yourself, Juli," her voice new, gasping ecstasy.

I remember awakening some vague, timeless eternity later, the pain a searing, unrelenting torment as I lay in a helpless despair, the thing shame to some ultimate extreme. I wrestled again with rope binding my wrists and ankles, struggled with frenzied, maniacal violence - and felt cries of primal anguish wrenched from my throat as I just gave up.

"Oh Juli -" her voice the same blatant swoon, "look at yourself - pissing all over yourself- it's quite disgusting."

"Chary -" my voice a pleading whisper for pain become a constant, burning torture. "Chary - please - let me go -"

"Juli - oh Juli - I'll never let you go - never. Oh Juli, I've waited so long for this - a Lady, and you. I'm going to torture you every way it's possible to do so."

"But Chary - it's - it's so wrong -"

"Wrong?" - nothing more than a gasp of wondering amusement. "Juli - I'm Syril's first heiress," she chuckled again, drew on her cigarette, waited until my struggles were yet again flailing desperation.

"Please -" my cry abject terror, the thing a black, sickening terror knowing my pleading cry futile. She wrapped a clawing hand to my arm - pressed the glowing tip of the cigarette onto my breasts. I remember writhing in finished agony, screams of primal abandon wrenched from my throat - heard in some clouded corner of my mind her frantic gasps of culminating, sexual ecstasy.

I remember it as timeless, my existence nothing but raw, biting agony which just wouldn't stop, the rope binding me in the darkness to an existence which hadn't ever been anything but my body immersed in waves of searing pain. I thought it for timeless eternities more than I could endure, thought anything more impossible. And yet - it just started again, the lash wrapping itself about my body even as I lay the strength to struggle against it long since gone, the lash biting, searing agony which just wouldn't stop.

Two of my girls found me laying naked atop garbage in some alley behind Orlie House, carried me to my rooms, nursed me for a month. I finally pushed myself to my feet, struggled along Orlie House's corridors, wandered down the central aisle in court. Chary stood in the midst of the usual assortment of gaudily attired Gentlemen and Lady admirers they busily currying the first heiress of Syril's favor, the usual assortment of newspapermen in the gallery leaning with their cameras, Syril's first heiress projecting an air of modest, dignified propriety. She turned as she noticed my approach - and it was little more than a moment's surprise in her eyes, nothing more than another moment's amused challenge. I turned my eyes another moment toward Syril's queen standing in the midst of dignitaries of various sort visiting from courts across Europe. I simply, I suppose, just gave up, might even have shrugged as I wandered back to my rooms, let two of my girls display familiarity toward me of a sort which had earned me frowns of disapproval from Paulisianna any number of times in the past.

"Miss Juli," two girls who had belonged to Chary whispered, "she's a monster. We'd already know'd that. But - you - a Lady - she's worse than a monster."

I'd decided just to get on with life, avoided Chary whenever I could, relished causing her various manner of irritation whenever possible. Arguing against courtier advocates arguing on behalf of Syril's first heiress in Paulisianna's court, I felt some new satisfaction whenever a decision rendered in my favor earned me a scowl of angry fury from Chary (and I have to admit that Paulisianna, possessed of and voicing firm, implacable opinions in such as the queen's sitting chamber, sighed in court nothing more than a passing moment's irritation when the facts of a particular case necessitated that she rule in my favor rather than Chary's, Syril's queen on occasion even wearing something very close to amusement in her features as Syril's first heiress stormed from court in a pouting fury.)

I'd decided just to get on with life - until I stood face to face with Chary on one of Orlie House back steps.

"I intend -" she repeated, flinging furious eyes toward my poor Hero, leaning again for the riding whip laying on the ground.

"I said no," I repeated, crushing my foot onto the whip.

"How dare - " and I winced in genuine pain for Chary's hand thrust with maniacal fury into my shoulder.

And for a quick little flash of eternity, queen Paulisianna's never ending exhortations toward ladylike behavior wound a frantic path through my mind, as did her enumeration of the possible consequences of my continuing to deport myself in an unladylike manner, Chary and I now "Ladies of the court who must endeavor always to present an example of refined, dignified propriety to the masses and most certainly must desist in behavior I might expect from a pair of harbor girls." I'll never know why Paulisianna's exhortations shot about the corners of my mind for nothing more than that one, timeless little instant. I winced in genuine pain for Chary's hand thrust to my shoulder, stood for another timeless little instant wondering how I might best in these circumstances present a demeanor of ladylike dignity and propriety toward a sizable crowd now gathered about the steps. I flung my eyes to Chary's - and felt in another timeless instant some strange mix of despondent remorse and wild, exhilarating fury. We landed together in the mud locked in wild, thrashing combat, the crowd's roar of delight and Fredrick's "my dear -oh - I say, my dear" all just some cacophony of nonsense from above.

Pain stabbing through my head for my hair snapped with brutal ferocity, I relished the gurgling gasps emanating from Chary's delicate little throat locked securely in my hands. Rolling about in the mud, my dress as we did so the form fitting attire preferred by most young Ladies of my temperament who worked for rather than just expected a living, I was, I suppose, vaguely aware that I was presenting the crowd entertainment of a sort it could never have anticipated in the sedate and refined environs of Orlie House. And I couldn't as quickly have cared less, a first heiress' gown costing a king's ransom mine to tear to shreds, Chary screaming in a maniacal rage for the affront, attacking in a frenzy of clawing, biting abandon. And yet the battle's outcome was never in doubt, I tall, amazon ferocity, quick and agile, Chary gasping in terror knowing she hadn't in the circumstances a chance. She bit again, clawed, kicked with viscous fury - and it was culminating, abandoned ecstasy for me, she mine to slam into the mud, primal terror in her eyes knowing she was about to be "beaten senseless."

And in another abrupt instant I felt firm though incomprehensibly gentle pressure to my arm, was whisked from the mud to my feet, finally noticed as my vision cleared that vice marshal Tanner restrained a wildly thrashing Chary with his other hand.

"All right, you's two -" vice marshal Tanner barked toward a pair of misbehaving chamber maids - and stood in another instant his features gaping disbelief. "Miss - Miss Chary - Miss Juli -"

"How dare -" Chary, always in character, screeched toward a middle aged, massively built vice marshal of the constabulary who despite his size and the nature of his profession had always impressed me as a gentle, mild mannered individual. "How dare - me - your hands on me - first heiress -" Chary snarled and spat. "Me - first heiress - you will most certainly be hung -"

"Mr. Tanner," I screamed as well, thinking once again, however, purposefully hoping to direct Chary's rage from marshal Tanner back to myself, "our oh so noble first heiress was about to whip a helpless animal," I gasping, nodding toward Hero and the riding whip laying on the ground.

"She put her hands on me - me - first heiress -"

"All right," Mr. Tanner finally groaned, despondent though resigned resolve and authority in his voice as he turned toward a still cowering Fredrick. "Sir, maybe you's could assist your Lady inta Residence," and Fredrick emerged from his stupor, stepped forward, edged a cautious, pleading hand onto Chary's arm. With a final, threatening snarl of fury toward the world, Chary allowed Fredrick to lead her away.

I glanced a moment's gloating triumph toward a torn and shredded gown plastered in mud - and a moment later finally allowed myself lucid, awakening reason.

"Oh Lord," I gasped, breathless and panting, my behavior over the past several minutes not by any stretch of the imagination "the refined, delicate demeanor" demanded by Syril's always unamused queen of a titled Lady of her court. Oh Lord, I gasped again - a form fitting dress usually falling just to my knees now coming nowhere near to doing so, lascivious delight in a sizable audience's eyes for a form of eminently mature proportions to which a damp and mud caked dress clung.

Mr. Tanner quickly noticed the despair settling into my eyes, turned a quick moment later toward the sizable crowd now gathered along Hetton Lane.

"Off with you's, you lazy, gawking louts," he barked in authoritative command. "Ain't you's nothin' better to do standin' round wastin' time," and the crowd, of course, fled with an obvious display of haste, Mr. Tanner nodding the last away with self assured demand. He then, I suppose, recalled the situation at hand, hesitant confusion once more in his features as he turned back to me.

"Miss Juli -" he tried, and stood in helpless silence.

"Mr. Tanner - what - what can I say?" I tried, and stood quite as helpless. A middle aged vice marshal of the constabulary stood the same gaping uncertainty in his features, he a gentle man of calm and collected temperament yet never, I suspect, having in his wildest dreams anticipated encountering a brawl on the steps of Orlie little different in appearance than any his constabulary dealt with nightly in the likes of the harbor. Deputy to Syril's Gentleman Marshal of the constabulary, (Mr. Tanner, therefore and of course, doing any real work needing done in constabulary headquarters) Mr. Tanner often carried armloads of documents of one sort or another from Syril Town's commons house to Orlie House's Chamber of State, polite propriety in his features encountering titled Gentlemen and Ladies along the corridors, gentle amusement in his features as he smiled toward court clerks, chamber maids, any commons girl under ninety of any sort smiling inviting mischief toward a youthfully middle aged man of ruggedly handsome appearance. I stood at the steps feeling, I suppose, as foolish as I'd ever to that point in my life felt. I'd any number of times over the past several years sat across table from Mr. Tanner I a prim and proper courtier advocate reviewing a case to be presented on appeal to Orlie House's court. And I suddenly stood at Orlie House's back steps my appearance not in the least different than might have been that of women who in the harbor performed nightly in a pool of mud (though I can never deny feeling even in a moment of shuddering, humiliating horror something very different than horrified humiliation. I'd any number of times over the past several years sitting across table from a middle aged man of ruggedly handsome appearance found myself struggling to maintain a demeanor of aloof, Ladylike propriety, Mr. Tanner to my reveling delight appearing as though engaged in every bit as furious a struggle. I'll always believe that he gazed helpless, confused sympathy toward a young Lady as she stood at Orlie House's steps her appearance something very different than it had been in a conference chamber along Orlie House's corridors. And still - I stood at the base of the steps in a damp, clinging dress which hid absolutely nothing - and I stood forgetting my horror long enough to stand in abandoned, swooning delight a sweet man of ruggedly handsome appearance even if for nothing more than a brief and fleeting moment all but gulping, his eyes directed for that brief and fleeting moment anywhere but toward my own.)

"Miss Juli - are you - are you all right?" Mr. Tanner finally asked, gentle sympathy in his voice.

"Yes, I'm fine, Mr. Tanner," and I stood another long moment in searching confusion, feeling little more than emotional turmoil for the fact that I was a "Miss," a Lady, and a second heiress on title. I still, however, couldn't bring myself to address Mr. Tanner familiarly. Chary, I seethed, settling again into vexing anger, has never thought twice about doing so. Mr. Brench, sixty, gray and distinguished as he presides at podium at the head of the commons, is "Wilbur" to Chary simply because his name appears on the commons rather than the titled lists. And I stood in genuine emotional turmoil that I hadn't for an instant thought of mentioning my suspicions regarding the more brutal aspects of Chary Syril's character to Mr. Tanner. I'd intimated them to Mr. Brench on several occasions, doing so, of course, in all manner of veiled, winding circumlocution. He'd reacted quite as I'd feared he must, the president of Syril's commons staring aghast at the suggestion of the most innocuous sort of impropriety on the part of Syril's "princess" Chary, Syril's first heiress to Mr. Brench that which she is to any shop keeper in town, an august personage residing on a lofty plain of existence entirely separate from his own, she a picture of sweet, gracious propriety appearing on moving picture screens across civilization. I felt, ultimately, some oppressive sense of loneliness gazing toward Mr. Tanner standing with him at Orlie House's steps, Mr. Tanner's a sane, rational world peopled by individuals doing their best just to survive, my own world Orlie House and all of its insidious little secrets. Mr. Tanner (and a great many others) are quite aware that Orlie House is something very different than the newspaper's portrayal of it {newspapermen daring portrayals of Orlie House substantially different than that promulgated by Orlie House's Chamber of State invited to visit that Chamber for consultation, transportation, as likely as not, provided by one of marshal Tanner's own associates.) Some probably even suspect that "the princess" Chary is at times something markedly, horribly different than the newspaper's portrayal of gracious, dignified propriety. No one, however, residing beyond the lofty, otherworldly confines of Orlie House, would publicly question the conduct of those residing on the elevated plain of existence in Orlie House. The constabulary suspecting it might have to do so in order to determine why a fifteen year old girl lays dead in a tenement room in the steel works will retreat from the effort in little less than terror.

"Miss Juli -" Mr. Tanner finally continued, the same searching, almost apologetic hesitation in his eyes, quite as though just witnessing Chary's and my altercation had been a transgression on his part, "I won't be botherin' to write up anything -"

"Mr. Tanner - do," I pronounced, suspecting even in the emotional turmoil of the moment that Syril's queen had already been informed of the incident in minute detail, Paulisianna's spies and informants inhabiting every dark corner of Syril both town and Residence, Mr. Tanner's failure to submit a report of his own a touching expression of sympathy for me, and yet a likely source of difficulty for him should the fact come to Paulisianna's attention. Syril's queen takes keen personal interest in such affairs as Chary's and mine. Marshals of constabulary across the northern half of the English Isles are little more than Paulisianna's spies, vice roys and vice reginas taking extreme pains to avoid attracting their attention.

I can't help but gaze another long moment toward Mr. Tanner offering my own silent apology for having involved him in all of this however inadvertently. Uncle Georgie, grandfather Jake's eldest son and therefore first on title, is generally considered to be as tolerant and as easy natured a king as any in Europe, cards, die, and beer of far greater interest to him than matters of state and protocol. Paulisianna, however, usually manages to work her will by various manner of posturing and intrigue. If all else fails, she will simply stamp her foot until uncle Georgie relents, "signing on the dotted line" rather than leaving cards, die, and cup unattended for any great length of time. Personages of considerably higher rank than marshals of the constabulary in country across the northern half of the English Isles subject to the queen of Syril's whims have been sent packing for maleficence far less flagrant than laying hands on Syril's first heiress.

"Mr. Tanner -" I tried, searching now for the words to voice my apology - and I gazed into eyes the essence, I suddenly realized, of perceptive brilliance, Mr. Tanner astounded for that which he suddenly detected in my own eyes - notice, even a genuine, anxious concern for his well being, and that, I little doubted, something he's never before seen in the eyes of a titled Gentleman or Lady. "Mr. Tanner," I continued, settling finally into the defiance always such and inescapable part of my character, "I won't allow Chary to make good her threats against you."

"Thank you, Miss Juli," he answered with a gentle smile, one which exuded, I suppose for my own benefit as much as for his own, ease and confidence. "Wouldn't be near the first time, though, I'd had to pack up and move on down the road anyway. I done marshalin' in a dozen towns cross the north, always someone hirin' in my chosen profession. I've had to move on a moment's notice more'n once comin' afoul a some Mr. or Miss. You just goes down the road. No big novel experience for me. But Miss Juli -"

My heart melts for the concern in his eyes.

"I'll be fine, Mr. Tanner -" though it's anything, I suppose, but ease and confidence in my own eyes. I simply can't comprehend the complacent ease in Mr. Tanner's features for the prospect of "just going down the road." I'm standing now, in fact, immersed in a fright as horrid as any I have ever felt, I a Lady my name to be stricken from title by Syril's queen, banished from the only way of life comprehensible to me.

"Miss Juli - if there was just - something I could do -" and I once more raised my eyes to Mr. Tanner's, all but gasping when I saw how genuine indeed was his concern for me. Mr. Tanner was seeing me, not just a titled inhabitant of a Residence the bizarre intimacies of which are by and large a mystery to all but its inhabitants.

"Where - where will you go, Mr. Tanner - if you do leave Syril?" I tried, searching, I knew, for a moment of genuine intimacy (and doing so, I realized just as quickly, enveloped in an abandon I'd never before felt. Syril's queen discovering me gazing with searching emotional intimacy into a commoner's eyes would have stood aghast for behavior the essence of the unladylike. Mr. Tanner stood himself for a very long moment something very close to stunned confusion in his eyes, he, I suspect, unable to perceive any substantial difference between a first and second heiress. He'd have stood in little less amaze, I suspect, had London's queen Caroline or Ruse's empress suddenly turned eyes abandoned to searching intimacy toward his own).

"Where -" he tried, recovering his composure a quick moment later. "Oh Lordy, Miss Juli - I couldn't really say with no certainty. Maybe up high country way, hire onta mining farm maybe. Maybe up to the Schelluns - always wanted to see them. Maybe even down London way, constables or army, both pays bout the same, cept army you's chasin' highwaymen or you ships out chasin' renegade chiefs who knows where, town bein' drunks and just general nuisance makers. I worked a year's contract down London way and they's a pretty little miss there I'd like to see again, works in linen shops, but intimated like she wouldn't be averse to settlin' down. If a did settle down, though, I don't think it'd be right in London Town."

"No, Mr. Tanner?"

"London Town'd be no place to raise young uns."

"No, I suspect not," I agreed with a sighing chuckle, London, whatever it was, incomprehensibly more than Syril.

"I marshaled a time on Winth Farm, west country, prettiest little place you ever seed, Miss Juli, one lane, hedgerows, the Gentleman's Residence, not more'n couple hundred souls all put together. Young uns was brought up right and proper on Winth Farm, don't even know nothin' bout such as a Madam Elsie's."

I can't help but give way to another soft, mischievous chuckle, Madam Elsies one of the more notorious of any number of establishments in Syril's harbor and industrial districts catering to the baser aspects of human nature as prevalent in Syril as in any other large town across the English Isles.

"And Mr. Carhry what's Gentleman on Winth Farm says he's holding a place on the lists for me case I ever do wanna come back. Don't know sometimes why I ever left, Miss Juli, just wanderin' lustful, I guess, wanted to see the bright lights."

"What's Winth Farm like, Mr. Tanner? It's in London country, you say?"

"Yeah, but far nuff out country so it ain't really contaminated by what Mr. Carhry and pastor Wilbren always called London's contaminatin' vice and such. Marshalin' on Winth wasn't but the title most times, couple kids maybe drinkin' too much or gotta hold a some bad opium outa London Town what Mr. Carhry don't allow on Winth anyway. Most a the time I just worked pasture long side a everyone else, maybe helped out in machine sheds. We had five tractors on Winth and couple a motor trucks runin' any given time. Price a gas dear what it is even down London way, though, we still worked draft horse most times."

"But it sounds wonderful, Mr. Tanner," gentle enchantment, I suspect, in my eyes. "I sometimes wish I'd been born on a small agricultural farm like your Winth. I sometimes wish I'd been born on Julia Ellen's old Norecomb Farm, four or five residences, a hundred souls, the likes of a Syril Town entirely incomprehensible to someone from the old North," and I raised my eyes to a kind, easy natured man returning a smile of gentle warmth. My fright, I realized, had given way to a long moment's wondering entrancemant fancying life as it might have been in the old North of Julia Ellen's time. A gentle, compassionate man such as Mr. Tanner (he, I just can't help but notice again, a man of ruggedly handsome countenance) would, standing at my side on old Norecomb Farm, have given me his eyes the notion of class, title, or rank entirely foreign, I just another resident listed on a title without all manner of division and distinction rather than some modern "dowager princess." Mr. Tanner gazes toward me as might a chid toward a porcelain figurine he perceives attractive but knows he's not supposed to touch. Mr. Tanner does speak the intimacies of his thought, yet he does so as he might to London's queen or Ruse's empress, nothing of a personal nature involved or possible.

And still - circumstances once more render the moment something very different than it might otherwise have been. Sitting across table from a young courtier advocate, Mr. Tanner, I suspect, had at least for brief and fleeting moments allowed himself to notice that the young Lady with whom he sat was, if not a dazzling court beauty, at least as pretty as most of the young court clerks who spent a great deal of their time batting inviting eyes toward a ruggedly handsome vice marshal of the constabulary. Mr. Tanner sitting across table from me couldn't, I suppose, help but have noticed at least for the brief and fleeting moment that which is just a fact, the Lady advocate with whom he sat attired as a young commons clerk might be rather than in flowing opulence, and her figure mature hourglass allure thought by many some classic ideal. And with that, I yet again stood at one of Orlie House's back steps the moment not quite like anything I'd ever before known. Like most young women of my age and temperament, I wear no supporting garments beneath my dress, wear only a dress cut to the common fashion of the day, a dress cut, in other words, to reveal my form a bit more explicitly than queen Paulisianna felt proper for a titled Lady (though Syril's queen herself at the time still an exceptionally beautiful woman her own figure some very noticeable feminine allure (the noticeable perfection of which her daughter Chary to Chary's never ending chagrin (and my sometimes amused delight) hasn't inherited) and Paulisianna given to occasional moods of ill concealed vanity, she seldom comments with any real vehemence on a dress the hemline of which falls just a bit further above the knees than some of the court's elder grande dames might consider proprietous for a Lady.) And to finish a culminating moment at Orlie House's steps, I've just engaged in a wrestling match which has left me standing in a bit of flimsy and clinging fabric which now hides absolutely nothing. I might just as well have stood entirely naked a pace or so away from a ruggedly handsome man he discoursing on his past, addressing a titled Lady - and a moment of quiet pause something not quite like anything I'd ever before known. He's yet again noticed that the porcelain figurine, though certainly no longer in appearance twelve or thirteen year old pristine innocence just ready for marriage, is still by no means unattractive. I'm not, I can readily admit, the dazzling, polished beauty which a Chary Syril or a Belina Albert or any number of other first heiresses are. And yet, the afore mentioned first heiresses glancing toward me will invariably do so with seething envy in their eyes. Those who on occasion dare common attire in pubic don't even bother if they know beforehand that I'm anywhere in the vicinity, know that a second heiress of no great consequence on title will as soon as she walks through the door be the universal object of men's drooling scrutiny.

And even with all of that, that timeless moment at the steps was something I'd never before known in quite the same way. Mr. Tanner had never directed anything close to blatant, drooling scrutiny toward me, had sitting across table from a courtier advocate in some conference chamber perhaps allowed himself a brief and fleeting moment's notice of that which is simply obvious, he never quite daring to admit even to himself that he was doing so (I perhaps pushing myself from the table, standing with cigarette in hand a few paces away my posture simply casual ease though it could, now that I think of it in retrospect, have been perceived a writhing little dance which had it been performed in Paulisianna's court would have landed me in jail). And in a sudden and abrupt instant I stood a pace or two away from him in very different circumstances, tumultuous despair and confusion in my features rendering me at least for moments a living, breathing young woman for him - and the fact that I might just as well have stood a pace or two away from him entirely naked finishing it all, something for a brief and fleeting moment finally and ultimately blatant and obvious in his eyes. I was for him, I knew with some strange clarity, everything he'd never quite dared allow himself to imagine me to be and something more than he could have imagined to begin with, that in his eyes which for that brief and fleeting moment and to my abandoned, ecstatic delight seemed dazed, gaping disbelief. I'm not really certain why the moment seemed so absolutely novel, leering young Gentlemen's drooling scrutiny never anything a great deal more than boring or irritating. And yet I couldn't for an instant deny the moment that which it was for me in fact. He stood a pace or two away from me he a ruggedly handsome man displaying very genuine concern for me - and for that brief and fleeting moment all but noticeably gulping aloud. And in that same instant - it was ultimately more than anything I'd ever before known, another breathe impossible unless he slammed my body into his arms, devoured me with kisses and caresses of abandoned, hungry want he knowing I was his to do with as he pleased.

Oh Lord - stop, I finally sighed, imagining the annoyance in Paulisianna's features did she witness that which was nothing less than wanton abandon in my eyes.

"I suppose - I suppose it's time for me to change my dress," I began, glancing toward same another quick moment, leaning in order to examine rips and tears - performing an exceptionally wanton little dance of twisting, writhing display.

"Yes, Miss Juli - of course -" he trying for complacent nonchalance - he as I lean free to devour me as he pleases.

"I suppose it's ruined," I sighed, running caressing hands to fabric clinging to my legs - stealing a glance just to be certain that a ruggedly handsome man was gulping, devouring me as he pleased.

Oh Lord, I sighed again, vanity, I decided, to be the subject of my evening devotions as I finally turned toward the steps, urging myself toward behavior a bit less wanton - and a twinge of pain in my knee as I attempted the first step nothing more than culminating delight. I staggered, must certainly collapse for that little twinge of pain. And then - it was everything I could ever have hoped it would be, his arms flung about my waist in supporting embrace.

I was by and large, I suppose, a breakable porcelain figurine as he helped me up the steps, his assistance the essence of cautious propriety. I suppose we'd both settled into some resigned sense of reality, I at the top of the steps to vanish into a world and a plain of existence detached and separate from his own. I finally, I suppose, admitted the delight coursing through my licentious little mind a moment's wicked vanity, decided, however, that all manner of pleasant little fantasy couldn't be anything more.

"Thank you, Mr. Tanner," I concluded at the top of the steps. "I must apologize - oh, I've been such a nuisance to you -" and I rested in his embrace another moment and another timeless little eternity. Take me away with you, I suppose I pled with a final flash of my eyes toward his own. Take me to a little farm somewhere, to a sane and rational world.

"A nuisance -?" he answered - as he held me a final moment and an impossibly timeless little eternity something like confusion in his features, he not quite certain why he was still standing his arms wrapped to my waste in firm, unrelenting embrace, I admitting even in the moment, I suppose, that I was all but dancing for him in maniacal, pleading abandon, desperate that he hold a woman rather than a porcelain figurine in his arms. And I danced for him yet again knowing that even if just pretty I had other advantages which were just a matter of fact, my form even then a figurine, yet one which I was eminently, vainly aware was universally perceived to be hourglass feminine perfection to every voluptuous extreme, was raw, magnetic allure to every inexplicable extreme.

I finally attempted retreat - and the thing yet again everything I could ever have hoped it would be, he denying me retreat, his hands crushed to my waist in capturing, furious embrace - a gasp of primal ecstasy wrenched helplessly from my throat he to crush me into his arms, rip my dress away-

"Miss Juli -" awakening panic in his eyes as he snatched his hands from my waste.

I'll never really know why I felt nothing more than a half instant's panic myself. I raised chastening eyes for his gesture of forward familiarity - and discarded every last pretense. My smile sultry and obvious, the dance I performed for him was nothing less, knowing, amused mischief settling into his eyes.

I raised my eyes again to his, settled finally into brutal reality.

"Mr. Tanner," I repeated, "I won't allow Chary to make good her threats against you," though he sees the despair in my eyes, Chary Syril little less than civilization's worshipped and adored "princess apparent" second only to London's Belina Albert.

"Miss Juli - I'll be fine," he insisted. "One don't rise through constable or army ranks holdin' a marshal's baton in his hand less'n one knows when it's time to chuck that baton inta nearest ditch, sneak out the back door while the sneakin's good."

I broke into genuine, mirthful laughter.

"And like I say, Miss Juli, I'm thinkin' serious it's time I went home anyway, Winth Farm the prettiest little place you ever did see -"

Behave, I whispered, I a Lady, a haven of sedate, pastoral beauty such as that which Julia Ellen knew someone else's rather than my dream. Behave, I whispered, turned toward the door - yet another delightful little twinge of pain suddenly shooting though my knee.

I finally pushed myself through a door Mr. Tanner would never have dreamt entering for improprietous purposes, no matter how obviously I intimated that the prospect of his doing so wasn't in the least objectionable to me. I settled into my rooms, collapsed onto a chair, settled back into a mood of dismal, brooding uncertainty. I wandered another moment into pleasant fantasy, wandered an untamed, primeval forest onto Julia Ellen's old Norecomb Farm - and sat in my rooms in Orlie House my surroundings in no way resembling the pristine innocence Julia Ellen had known in the old North. Mr. Tanner, hailed as he was from country no great distance from London Town, has heard every manner of rumor regarding crown Residences as they are today, a great many rumors regarding London's Albert House, subterranean vaults resembling "medieval dungeons" used by Harold during the Great War in a manner no less brutal or horrid than similar chambers in Ruse and the east are still used today.

Standing at my window that evening supposing a summons requesting my appearance in court already in the works, I gazed in brooding quiet toward passers by strolling the lanes, many of them gazing in wondering speculation toward the spires and turrets of Orlie House, many suspecting that today's "castles and palaces" must certainly resemble antiquity's and Harold VIII's. Today's crown Residences certainly resemble antiquity's in a manner of immediate concern to me. Born a Lady into one, I am and always will be a prisoner to my fate, the fantasy of residing on a small outcountry farm of the sort Julia Ellen might have known never to be anything more than a fantasy to me, a kind, sweet - and ruggedly handsome man such as Mr. Tanner inhabiting a world very different than the one in which I due simply to matters of title am imprisoned. (And I suppose, before I'm done, I'll have something to say about the titled Gentlemen an imprisoned Lady is expected to choose from, will elaborate using terms such as arrogant, effeminate, childish, brutal, imbecilic air heads).

I awoke the next morning to a gentle wrap to my door.

"Miss Juli," a young house marshal nodding polite propriety as he placed the envelope into my hand, he supposing it some mundane document such as he'd delivered to a courtier advocate on frequent occasion over the past several years.

"Thank you, Jemmi," I smiled, and hoped as I had on frequent occasion that I concealed most of the mirthful amusement I felt from my smile. I'll always wonder what a moment like this might have been in the wild, untamed North. A young man my own age (who was exquisite, maddening beauty) gulped a great deal more obviously than had a middle aged marshal of the constabulary. He never allows himself to forget that I'm a Lady. Worse yet, I'm nineteen. He therefore and of course gazes toward a Lady ten or twenty years his senior any notion of pristine innocence unthinkable. And yet - he notices that which is obviously and inescapably noticeable, that which is something more than just the numbers. I'll never, I suppose, be able to define it myself, know only that I'm a breathing statue of voluptuously mature form which is perceived feminine allure to inexplicably - arousing extremes (that the reason why I haven't for quite some time now dared quiet evenings alone with any Gentleman anywhere close to my own age, the most sedate and reserved of them in the end just lunging in frenzied attack until I have to toss them into the shrubbery beneath my window (another stern lecture from Paulisianna regarding behavior "most unbecoming of a titled Lady" then to be endured)). Glancing another instant toward the envelope I held, I raised my eyes toward a young house marshal awaiting a casual nod of thanks - he a maddening, entrancing young man every fourteen year old girl's dream who a hundred times already had crushed his hands to my waist knowing my gasp of protest nothing more than coy, requisite demurring, I floating in helpless, swirling oblivion as he gently eases my body through the door, kicks it shut - I a Lady and yet what meaning has place and position between the two of us as he crushes me into his arms, I everything he's imagined me to be in a hundred fantasies. And finally - we're just a young man and a young woman, know it's still wrong. But haven't we a hundred times standing at my door seen that fleeting moment of knowing intimacy in each other's eyes, knowing that we're both imagining a moment of supreme intimacy. And then, we've just giving up, our love making the wild, frenzied abandon we'd always dreamed it would be.

"Miss - Miss Juli -?"

I raised my eyes from a horrid little envelope I held in my hand. Behave, I suppose I demanded of myself, a moment's wicked little fantasy enough as it was.

"Jem -" I tried - as I stood in hopeless despair the envelope I held in my hand presaging my doom. "Jem -" I tried again - as I buried my eyes to his, my breasts heaving in breathless violence, one last moment of supreme ecstasy with a sweet young man whose eyes spoke sudden, gaping disbelief. Stop, I demanded of myself - and I gave up entirely, a sweet young man helplessly shuddering in raw, primal want for me leaving me immersed in an abandon I'd never before felt in quite the same way.

"Jem -" I tried one last time - and my voice a breathless whisper as I buried my eyes to his, the writhing, inviting little dance I performed blatant to every possible extreme. Take me, I might just as well have gasped aloud, and I shuddered in waiting ecstasy for his eyes wide in gaping disbelief - and in another timeless instant the thing something a world more, a gasp of frenzied abandon wrenched from his throat as he flung his hands to my waste, he and I falling together through the door, gasping together for the sound of it slamming closed. And finally - it's dazed, reeling oblivion in a sweet young man's features as he buries his lips onto mine, crushes my body into his arms, he probably never quite aware that I've wrenched a hand onto his, pushed it from my waist to feminine curves which are his to fondle, to search and explore as he wishes. It's a gasp of culminating fury wrenched from his throat and then - oh God, I cried in tumultuous confusion for awakening despair in a sweet young man's eyes.

I'll never really know why I felt nothing more than a timeless instant's disappointment.

"Miss - Miss Juli - " and I flung my eyes to awakening terror in a sweet young man's features. He in a moment of insane passion has just wrestled London's queen or the empress of Ruse through her chamber's door, buried his mouth onto hers a hand pushed to groping intimacy - and he awakening in terror his life over.

"Jemmi -" I gasped myself in panic for the despairing fright in his eyes, and an answer coursing into my mind a quick instant later. "Jemmi -" and it's nothing less than conspiratorial mischief in my voice. "Jemmi - we - we really shouldn't, should we? I mean - what would they all say - you and I ravishing each other - oh, we really shouldn't, should we?"

"No - no, Miss Juli - of course -"

"And the queen -? Oh Jemmi, she'd be so furious with us. We - we really mustn't."

"No, Miss Juli. Miss Juli - how - how can I possibly say -"

"Jemmi - you don't have to. I'm not - entirely displeased that you like me."

"Miss Juli - I do. I always have," though he gazed, to my initial confusion, toward my eyes. "Miss Juli, I've always enjoyed bringing you messages. You're the only one who smiles, and - it's so nice -"

Behave - and burying my eyes to those of a sweet young man who notices me rather than just the obvious, I flung my hands to my shoulders, to the straps of my dress.

"Miss Juli - the house captain - needs me -" and a sweet young man fleeing in panic through the door, I awoke yet again, settled into a mood of resigned amusement.

Oh Lord, I finally sighed, retrieved the envelope from the floor, decided to wait until later for a great deal of necessary, chastening introspection.

Collapsing onto a chair, I extracted the summons from the envelope with hands trembling only slightly less violently than I might have anticipated when I had fallen into a dismal, despairing sleep last night.

"The Lady Julia of Syril, presenting this, will be granted audience by George and Paulisianna, by the grace of God king and queen of Syril and the dominions ..."

Pushing myself to my feet, then in sluggish despondence toward the window, I gazed long, brooding minutes across Orlie House's delicately manicured lawns and gardens, gardeners and their boys pruning decorative shrubbery, maid servants stealing a minute or two near the fountains smoking cigarettes, a delivery man and a doorman smoking marijuana until a scowling house captain nods them about their business. Toying with a cigarette myself attempting to settle my nerves, I raised my eyes toward the spreading expanse of Syril Town, any illusion that it resembled Julia Ellen's little farm of a hundred souls impossible, Syril miles of densely packed structures spreading up from the harbor, residences in nearby hills the size of some crown Residences elsewhere. As always, I found my curious attention drawn back to the harbor, have over the years spent endless hours lost in quiet, introspective thought contemplating rough and bustling life so different than that which is to be found about the sedate and genteel environs of Orlie House (have to my aunt Paulisianna's annoyance spent a great deal of my time contemplating life in the harbor while seated in the midst of it, I in attire no different than that worn by young clerks working in dockside freight offices allowing myself all manner of pleasant little fantasy as handsome young men offering me a cigarette allowed themselves the same). Sailors from ports around the world pass their time in seedy taverns about the wharves. Horse and motor wagons already pick a cautious way along every lane and alley. Untold thousands of them in another hour will render the scene seeming chaos, the constabulary likely to stumble on drunken brawls engulfing traffic lanes in their entirety. Vice roys from outcountry farms across the north will appear in commons courts to collect chastened field hands, commons court justices "revenue agents" for Paulisianna and Orlie House. Emissaries from courts across the English Isles will plead for the release of over land freight drivers, will gain their release only after an hour's hard bargaining over the amount of various fines, levies, surcharges, assessments, and sundry and various costs and expenses the rate schedules something in which Paulisianna takes a keen personal interest. A (specified?) number of overseas freighters find themselves interned in Syril's harbor every year. Kings and queens from country across civilization make sizable contributions to Paulisianna's household purse in order to recover particularly valuable loads of freight.

I'm not quite certain why the like of the harbor or the sprawling industrial districts so fascinate me, their life in the raw endlessly intriguing. Standing another long minute at my room's window sighing at least a measure of tension away, I once more traveled time and distance to Julia Ellen's old Norecomb Farm, the entire community, if Julianna's portrayal is correct, no larger than any outcountry farm anywhere on the English Isles today. I suspect we'll never know for certain. Charles of London assisted by George of Syril and most of the dozen other of Europe's prominent kings funded, several years ago, a joint expedition into the North attempting to locate the site of old Norecomb, Julianna and various other literary sources sought for clues. The expedition spent a thousand weight gold, dug a couple hundred holes, and yielded, proclaimed academies in London and Syril, inconclusive results at best (the expedition, I've little doubt, proclaimed a resounding success by the afore mentioned Charles of London and George of Syril, the expedition an excuse to abandon for several weeks the tedious boredom of their courts to their queens. Repairing to field tents in the North said well stocked with casks of beer and littered with cards and die, Charles and George annoyed the academicians with a few ludicrous questions and then spent most of their time with card, cup, and die in hand.)

Julia Ellen's poetry, however, rather than artifacts and the like, remains that which most certainly and most intimately touches my heart. The culture of old Norecomb seems to have been very different than our own, life in the old North raw and basic, little more comprehensible to the modern mind than might be the cultures of Rome or the Americas. And Julia Ellen certainly seems to have been a queen very few today are able to comprehend, poor Julia Ellen finishing her life in exile, banished according to Julianna by her husband the king of old Norecomb. And still, Julia Ellen's is almost exclusively love poetry, the same husband reputed to have banished her forever in her heart, a reconciliation of sorts hinted in some of her later verse.

Affairs of the heart today? Charles and Caroline Albert of London, perhaps, though its an ill concealed secret that even they have now retired to separate apartments in separate corners of Albert House, Charles absenting himself from Residence entirely whenever possible, a field tent with his armies along some frontier (if well stocked with beer) to be preferred to mundane, day to day life at court. George and Paulisianna Syril's marriage is generally assumed to have been the culmination of a trade pact, a considerable weight of gold and silver changing hands at the conclusion of negotiations. Gazing long and hard at my room's window, I raised my eyes again toward the southern horizon, toward the London of today. If Syril, however, is not Julia Ellen's quiet and idyllic little community from antiquity, London, no matter how direct its decent from Norecomb and the old North, most certainly is not. Syril Town would be entirely incomprehensible to anyone from the old North. Gazing from my window toward the sprawling expanse of Syril Town, I'm gazing toward a Roman "urbs" or an American "city." And yet London Town is incomprehensibly more than Syril. Quiet and idyllic old Norecomb, I suppose, passed with Julia Ellen. Should I indeed be banished to Charles and Caroline Albert's London, I could look forward to a noisy hive of industrial chaos the like of which Julia Ellen could never have imagined. Most would argue that a time traveling resident of antiquity's Rome or New York would find today's London Town eminently comprehensible.

Sighing myself back into the lonely desperation of modern reality, I descended Orlie House's staircases, presented my summons to house marshals at the Front Room's doors, was then ushered to a seat midway along the length of the central aisle. Georgie, bland, balding, possibly asleep, slumped in a chair at the edge of the dais. If his snores become audible, Paulisianna, seated far more conspicuously and proprietously, will twist about in her chair and deliver a rousing poke to the king of Syril's ribs. No more than a dozen people seemed to have business with Syril's court this morning, a cough or a scraping chair echoing loudly from the towering vault of the Front Room's ceiling during frequent lulls in the proceedings. Settling onto my chair, I listened with passing interest as two young woman dressed in worn "road clothing," refugees from some war involving a half dozen of the continent's Middle Countries, pled for sanctuary.

"We would sincerely wish to accommodate you, my dears," Paulisianna pronounced. "However- we find ourselves in difficult financial straights at the moment." (I suppose Paulisianna's clerks of the vault could arrange accounts so as to render her statement at least marginally believable.)

I can't help but gaze with sympathetic concern toward the girls as they grasp each other's hands in supporting embrace, something of their ordeal clearly evident in the strained and fatigued expressions on their faces. It's difficult to tell, however, how matters will progress. Paulisianna releases little more than a pondering sigh listening to the pleading of the girls' advocate. Syril's queen has hung highwaymen with no greater emotion evident in her features, will not hesitate to post armies along some colonial frontier in order to deter wandering refugees from crossing those frontiers and thereby wreaking havoc on the household purse. I suspect that Paulisianna, at least in a corner of her mind, is genuinely concerned for the girls' difficulties. I suspect further, however, that Syril's queen is hoping to hear the girls admit to being heiresses with more money on deposit in some vault within easy reach of Syril than they or their advocate have yet admitted, money a certain percentage of which queen Paulisianna would greatly enjoy having on deposit in Syril's (read Paulisianna's) crown vault. Glancing again toward the girls, I can, I suppose, only speculate, something about their demeanor seeming to indicate that they may indeed be first heiresses with reasons of one sort or another to conceal their identities. Paulisianna, as usual, hedged all bets.

"Perhaps, my dears," Syril's queen pronounced, "we may be able to provide you another month's provisional sanctuary in our guestrooms. Apply to me again in a month's time, my dears," by which time the girls' situation will have been thoroughly investigated by Paulisianna's agents and informants scurrying about Residence corridors and back alleys in country across Europe. The girls and their advocate withdrew, Paulisianna aiming a glance of telling advice and council to the latter who will again approach Syril's throne with this case only when certain that all parties involved (the throne at a minimum) will realize some greater financial advantage from his doing so.

I listened for another hour and with rapidly diminishing interest as Paulisianna bought and sold things, expensively attired merchanters and their agents from town and country around the world bowing with courtly and solicitous smiles, then escorted to clerks tables in order to sign contract pacts.

My own case, I suppose an embarrassment to Paulisianna, was left until last. When everyone save clerks and ushers had retired from the chamber, I was with a tilt of Paulisianna's head finally beckoned forward. I proceeded with cautious and hesitant step, hanging my head in trembling quiet as I waited. Paulisianna passed another long minute pursuing papers she held in her hands, those obviously vice marshal Tanner's report regarding my altercation with Syril's first heiress Chary.

When Paulisianna raised her eyes, however, I noticed in them something I hadn't seen the past half dozen times I'd stood before her in similar circumstances. Paulisianna was actually seeing me, decision obvious in the set of her features. My luck, I realized, had finally run out.

"Juli," the queen of Syril began with a sigh hinting at least a measure of sympathetic concern, "I realize that it hasn't been easy for you all alone. The Lady Julia's passing was an untimely tragedy -"

"Aunt Paulisianna - Chary was going to -"

"Juli, you are a second heiress on title, a Lady of my court," and Paulisianna stares me into shuddering silence, waits I suspect, for the impact of her words to settle. "Imagine my surprise - my - utter horror -" Paulisianna waving her papers in the air, "when I was presented these. This - vice marshal of the constabulary Tanner, I said to myself, is certainly dillusional. Two Ladies of my court couldn't possibly deport themselves in a manner such as is portrayed in this report. He must certainly be talking about a pair of harbor women. I must, therefore, instruct the police ministry to reevaluate the terms of this Mr. Tanner's employment -"

"No -" I gasped, and even in the trauma of the moment I felt a subtle little twinge of pride for that self sacrificing "no." I just couldn't, however, allow Mr. Tanner to suffer a fate he didn't deserve. Raising hesitant, cautious eyes, I noticed in Paulisianna's the clear hint of approval. Even so, she passed another minute making certain, the same piercing penetration in her gaze, that which whatever else leaves me and everyone else who has ever stood before her in court in no doubt that Paulisianna is a queen in every commonly understood sense of the word, one of that dozen most powerful and consequential in Europe before whom prevarication is anything from senseless to suicidal.

''But Chary," Paulisianna proceeded, "who after all is Syril's first heiress, assures me that Mr. Tanner's report is something of an exaggeration, certainly as regards her own participation in this most - sordid affair. Chary intends to bring suit against Mr. Tanner for that which she insists is criminal defamation. Certainly you wish to do the same, Juli."

"No," I just repeated, a despondent sigh this time.

"I see," Paulisianna continued, finality in her voice. "Very well, Juli. First, let me assure you that I intend to hear Chary's suit against Mr. Tanner. I will then, I suspect, be pleased to hear a counter suit presented by Mr. Tanner. I suspect, if preliminary inquiries into this matter are any indication," Paulisianna already, of course, apprised of the matter in explicit detail by any number of spies and informants, "Chary is going to suffer a considerable financial reverse by the time suit and counter suit is heard. My daughter, if even half of that is true which has been alleged regarding her own involvement in this matter, is not going to escape the consequences of her involvement unscathed. Chary may well rue the day she ever drew breath in Syril before she has atoned for such - blatantly unladylike behavior. And if it should be proven that Mr. Tanner's report reflects the truth in anything close to its entirety, preliminary inquiries suggesting that it may well do so, I am seriously considering measures which will have a far greater - impact, Chary a mature woman her behavior the essence of childish display that necessitating in open court the application of raw, judicial warmth to the very seat of the matter."

I found myself choking back that which might have been a gasp of raucous, explosive laughter, found myself an instant later seeking Paulisianna's eyes with greater intimacy than I'd ever dreamt I'd dare, expressing genuine, heartfelt appreciation. Paulisianna returned a perceptible nod, that however, far and away enough, more than I might ever have dared hope to receive from Syril's queen.

The moment passed, however, and Paulisianna released a final, deciding sigh. Even that, however, touches an emotional chord in my heart. Had I stood before Paulisianna a highwayman or the like, I'd have been sent to the gallows in an idle instant, Paulisianna's features a nod of boredom as the accused is led away. Paulisianna's sigh for me, however, even if an unprecedented and touching expression of concern, is also a "roll of the drum," the sentence I am about to receive definitive even if not formal, judicial proceeding to be recorded on the court's ledgers, the sentence perceived by a great many Gentlemen to necessitate a pistol held forthwith to the head, perceived by most titled Ladies to necessitate secluded retirement, wasting starvation of body and spirit until nature has run its course.

"I think it best," Paulisianna, queen of Syril finally pronounced, "that we apply to your aunt Caroline in London's court, Juli, inquire if she would be so good as to provide you a place for the time being."

I stood in trembling desperation, longing for the warmth of my mother's arms. I raised eyes stung with tears to uncle Georgie, Syril's king now awake, following the proceedings with obvious interest and concern. I entertained no real hope, however, that Georgie would countermand Paulisianna's decision.

"Perhaps it's for the best, my dear," uncle Georgie began. "Who knows, you might enjoy living in London, big place, lots to do, and Charlie's not a bad sort in the least. Beer in London, they tell me, flows like a river - wouldn't know myself of course - and that scoundrel Charlie drinks half of it himself -"

Aunt Paulisianna turned - scowled. Syril's king sighed, shrugged, lowered his head onto his chest and went back to sleep.

It hadn't, I told myself as I stumbled from court paroled into my own custody, really been banishment. At least it hadn't been the ceremonial proceeding in which a common resident's name is blotted from the lists, the accused escorted from town by the constabulary, escorted to the gallows if the offense warranted. Family, particularly Ladies who have fallen from favor at court, are generally and as quietly as possible just packed off to whatever relation can be persuaded to take them. Even Henriett Ellen, a second heiress a half dozen steps from the throne who had a nasty habit a sprinkling poison into the cups of those standing between her and the throne, was just packed off to a distant cousin who raised goats in a small "backwood" country somewhere in northern Quebec.